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In this article we document a reversal of fortune within the Western agricultural core, showing that regions which made early transition to Neolithic agriculture are now poorer than regions that made the transition later. The finding contrasts recent influential works emphasizing the beneficial role of early transition. Using data from a large number of carbon-dated Neolithic sites throughout the Western agricultural area, we determine approximate transition dates for about 60 countries, 280 medium-sized regions, and 1,400 small regions. Our empirical analysis shows that there is a robust negative, reduced-form relationship between years since transition to agriculture and contemporary levels of income both across and within countries. Our results further indicate that the reversal had started to emerge already before the era of European colonization.

Intro -- Acknowledgement -- About This Book -- Introduction -- Contents -- About the Author -- 1 NATO: Origin, Legal Adaptation, and Roles -- Introduction -- NATO: Origin and Legal Adaptation -- NATO's Evolving Role in the Post-Cold War Era -- NATO's Out of-Area Strategies in Post-Cold War Period -- The First Mechanism is to Have New Non-Western Europe Members in NATO -- The Second Mechanism: The Continued Issuance of the Strategic Concept -- The Third Mechanism: The Policy of Projecting Stability in 2016 -- Position of the Arab Region in NATO Strategies -- The Mediterranean Dialogue, 1994 -- The Role of NATO in Addressing Gulf and Arab Crises -- The Importance of the Arabian Gulf Region to NATO -- 2 Istanbul Cooperation Initiative (ICI) (2004) -- Introduction -- The Theoretical Framework for Relation of the Arabian Gulf Countries with NATO -- The Theoretical Framework for the Relationship Between Regional Security and Global Security -- Istanbul Cooperation Initiative: Contexts, Foundations, and Practical Frameworks -- Visions of the Arab Gulf States for the Istanbul Cooperation Initiative (ICI) -- The Gulf States Stances on the Istanbul Cooperation Initiative -- Areas of Security and Military Cooperation Between NATO and the Gulf ICI Members -- NATO and Cooperation with the Gulf Countries in the Field of Soft Security -- Evolution and Evaluation of the Gulf-Atlantic Partnership -- Mechanisms for Maximizing the Gulf States' Benefits from NATO -- 3 Role of NATO in Addressing Regional Security Threats to the Arabian Gulf Countries -- Introduction -- NATO's Role in Addressing Threats to Maritime Security -- NATO's Role Concerning Iranian Threats -- NATO's Role in Bolstering the Iraqi Security Capabilities -- NATO's Role in Combating Terrorism -- NATO's Role in Energy Security.

Intro -- Contents -- List of Figures -- Introduction -- Chapter 1: The Chinese Birdcage -- Birds in a Cage -- Reform and Opening Up -- Shock Therapy Versus Gradualism -- Reform in a Centrally Planned Economy -- Chapter 2: Western Triumphalism -- The Thatcher/Reagan Revolution -- The Fall of the Berlin Wall -- The End of History -- China's Accession to the World Trade Organization -- Chapter 3: China as the World's Factory -- Manufacturing Powerhouse -- Minuscule Wages -- The Planners' Hand -- One Big Factory Floor -- A Great Wall of Money -- China's Sovereign Wealth Funds -- Chapter 4: Housing Bubbles Across the Western Hemisphere -- Western Hedonism -- Loose-Fitting Monetary Policy -- Blaming China -- House Prices -- Household Debt -- Lax Lending Standards -- Rising Income Inequality -- Income Inequality in Rich Countries -- The Rise of Populism -- Chapter 5: The Global Financial Crisis -- Cracks in the Financial Ceiling -- End of House Market's Bull Run -- The Demise of Bear Stearns -- The Slowing of the Music -- When the Music Stopped -- The Big Wall Street Bailout -- The World Beyond America -- The Crisis in the Euro Area -- Snowball Effect -- Rescue -- Chapter 6: The Economic Fallout -- Wall Street -- Main Street -- Government -- China and Beyond -- Great Recession -- Secular Stagnation -- Chapter 7: Unlimited Supplies of Labor -- Arthur Lewis' Essay -- The Model -- The Use of the Capitalist Surplus -- Open Economy -- Chapter 8: China's Economic Development -- International Comparison -- Sources of Productivity Growth -- China's Savings Rate -- Government Savings -- Household Savings -- Corporate Savings -- Absorption Constraints -- Chapter 9: Corporate Cash Piles and Falling Interest Rates -- Ballooning Current Accounts -- Exchange Rate Regimes -- Natural Resources and Current Account Surpluses -- Feedback Loops -- Causality.

In this comprehensive study of Belgian settlement in western Canada, Cornelius Jaenen shows that Belgian immigration was unique in its character and brought with it significant benefits out of proportion to its comparatively small numbers. Canadas first Immigration Act (1869) included Belgium among the "preferred countries" from which immigrants should be sought, but unlike many other European countries, Belgium did not encourage its nationals to emigrate to relieve economic, demographic, and social crises, and Belgian officials took a strong interest in their emigrants, monitoring the conditions of settlement and, where fraud was discovered, intervening diplomatically and paying for repatriation. The result was a resourceful body of settlers adaptable to both anglophone and francophone communities and adept at promotion and raising of capital. The first wave of immigration, beginning in the 1880s, consisted mainly of farmers to southern Manitoba and miners to Vancouver Island. A second wave after 1896, facilitated by a direct steamship link to Antwerp, brought more miners, as well as orchard planters to the Okanagan, sugar beet farmers to Alberta, and dairymen to Manitoba. World War I was followed by a further wave of agriculturally oriented settlement, and World War II by a mainly urban and skill-oriented cohort. In all cases, Belgians differed from the larger immigrant groups in that they were not recruited by important immigration societies and did not settle in ethnic blocs. There is probably no one better equipped than Cornelius Jaenen to write the history of the Belgians in western Canada. An eminent historian and the son of Flemish and Walloon Belgian immigrants himself, Professor Jaenen has gleaned, from Belgian and Canadian archival sources and from local, community, and family histories, a story rich in detail and context that will be invaluable to Canadians of Belgian origin as well as scholars and students of western Canadian ethnic and immigration studies.

At the World Education Forum of Dakar in 2000, international aid institutions committed to massive financial aid to the educational systems in developing countries because these sectors' performed poorly during the 1990s. These international aid institutions promised that no country that demonstrated a serious commitment for education, especially primary education, would lack financial resources. Participants in the forum stressed the necessity for governments to work toward the goal of primary education for all. Implementing the funding strategies that the Dakar commitment called for may have a negative impact on those developing countries. Using West African Monetary and Economic Union (WAMEU) data and international comparisons, we show the limits of these funding strategies. Contrary to our hypothesis, the analysis suggests that human capital of university level negatively affects economic growth of these countries. The types of higher education trainings available in those countries as well as issues of quantity and quality may explain those results. The evaluation of the role of human capital of university level through its effects on technological progress suggests condition for its positive effect on economic growth. This analysis stressed the idea that public funds should promote a proportional expansion of each educational level at every stage of development in those countries. This seems to be the condition to reap the fruits of educational system. ; La situation des systèmes éducatifs dans les Pays en Voie de Développement est devenue si préoccupante, au cours des décennies 90, que les institutions internationales, en 2000 à Dakar, se sont vues obligées de prendre l'engagement d'une assistance financière massive. Elles promettent qu'aucun pays, qui a pris l'engagement sérieux en faveur de l'éducation (de base prioritairement), ne verra ses efforts contrariés par le manque de ressources. La mise en œuvre des stratégies de financement qu'impliquent les engagements de Dakar peut, à moyen ou long termes, produire des effets pervers dans les pays sous-développés concernés. En utilisant les statistiques des pays de l'UEMOA et en faisant des comparaisons internationales, nous avons montré les limites de cette stratégie de financement. Contrairement à notre hypothèse, le capital humain de niveau d'éducation supérieur produit un effet négatif sur la croissance économique de ces pays. Les problèmes de quantité et de qualité ainsi que les types de formations supérieures répandus dans ces pays peuvent être la cause de ses résultats. En revanche, l'évaluation du rôle du capital humain de niveau d'éducation supérieur sur la croissance de la productivité, à travers son effet sur le progrès technologique, fait apparaître les conditions pour l'obtention d'un effet positif, de ce type de capital humain, sur la croissance économique. Cette analyse renforce l'idée de la nécessité d'une stratégie, de financement public, orientée vers un développement proportionnel des différents niveaux éducatifs à chaque stade du développement des pays. Ceci semble être la condition pour jouir du trésor que cache le système éducatif.

In our study we investigated the motivational and ideological correlates of the approval of welfare services in postsocialist Central Eastern and Western Europe. In the centre of our inquiry stood how the motivations of selflessness and conventionality, along with distributional justice principles, are related to our welfare preferences beyond our rational self-interest, furthermore, how these associations depend on social-cultural circumstances. We have found that the motivational background of egalitarian economic and welfare attitudes are substantially different in the two regions. While beside of the rationalisation of self-interest, it seems to be related to selflessness-driven solidarity in Western Europe, pro-welfare and egalitarian distributional views are primarily motivated by conventionality-driven norm adherence in postsocialist countries in the form of the mechanism of postsocialist economic system nostalgia. Our results highlight the benefits of a context-specific 'motivated social cognition' approach to ideological and political attitudes.

In our study we investigated the motivational and ideological correlates of the approval of welfare services in postsocialist Central Eastern and Western Europe. In the centre of our inquiry stood how the motivations of selflessness and conventionality, along with distributional justice principles, are related to our welfare preferences beyond our rational self-interest, furthermore, how these associations depend on social-cultural circumstances. We have found that the motivational background of egalitarian economic and welfare attitudes are substantially different in the two regions. While beside of the rationalisation of self-interest, it seems to be related to selflessness-driven solidarity in Western Europe, pro-welfare and egalitarian distributional views are primarily motivated by conventionality-driven norm adherence in postsocialist countries in the form of the mechanism of postsocialist economic system nostalgia. Our results highlight the benefits of a context-specific 'motivated social cognition' approach to ideological and political attitudes. ; peerReviewed ; publishedVersion

The principal purpose of this theoretical analysis is to identify the different assumptions between Europe and Turkey regarding the axiological perspective which distinguishes the value judgments used as an instrument of persuasion by each culture. For decades, Turkey's accession process within the EU is a highly controversial issue which has been an intensive process, brimmed with ups and downs. Due to its geopolitical position and cultural identity, as a Muslim secular state, Turkey is a cultural bridge between the West and Muslim countries, making it particularly important in cultural diplomacy for EU foreign policy. Nevertheless, the cultural misunderstanding, the misinterpreted perceptions, the axiological nihilism between Turkey and the EU seems to be the sources of tension for Turkey's accession. The recent official declaration by both sides, which is dialectic rather than a consensus, has also deteriorated the diplomatic ties established between them, while also underlining the weaknesses of cultural diplomacy.

This text provides a multi-scalar analysis of contemporary West African migration towards Europe, examining the local dynamics of a migration regime that positions itself in the tensions between broader agendas of labour mobility, development and security.

Jobrotation als wichtiges Element der Arbeitsmarktpolitik hat in den meisten Mitgliedsländern der Europäischen Union, mit Ausnahme der skandinavischen Länder, eine kurze Tradition. Erst Ende 1995 wurde die transnationale Partnerschaft "Jobrotation" auf europäischer Ebene angeregt und Projektfinanzierung hauptsächlich durch die Gemeinschaftsinitiative ADAPT, aber auch aus den europäischen Strukturfonds ermöglicht. Jobrotation bezeichnet dabei die Verbindung von Weiterbildung für Beschäftigte und Stellvertretung durch zuvor Arbeitslose. In den nichtskandinavischen Ländern der EU wurden daraufhin eine Vielzahl an lokalen Initiativen gestartet, die unter sehr heterogenen institutionellen und finanziellen Rahmenbedingungen ihre Arbeit aufnahmen. Da aus diesen Gründen ein rein quantitativer Vergleich der Ergebnisse der Einzelprojekte nur schwer möglich ist, versucht diese Studie, die jeweiligen Startbedingungen, die rechtlichen, politischen, finanziellen Rahmenbedingungen auf nationaler und lokaler Ebene sowie die betrieblich relevanten Voraussetzungen für Jobrotationsprojekte zu untersuchen. Das Untersuchungsdesign identifiziert zunächst die wichtigsten Problemfelder für Jobrotationsprojekte, abgeleitet aus der Theorie der Übergangsarbeitsmärkte, und leitet daraus hypothetische Erfolgsbedingungen ab, die dann mit jeweils mehreren quantitativen und qualitativen Erfolgsindikatoren zusammengeführt werden. (HH)

The International Monetary Fund has established itself as the most important economic actor among the many international agencies of our day. Indeed, the most powerful market-economy governments and banks now look to it for leadership in assessing and resolving the key difficulties of world finance. But the I.M.F. has yet to resolve the major problem that it faces as an institution and that its most influential members refuse to recognise as they try to fashion a world economic order: dominated politically, legally, and institutionally by the market élite, the Fund has yet to make the cultural and political leap necessary to understand and work with, rather than against, the majority of its members who are in the Third World. Until the I.M.F. does so, it will continue to be harshly criticised and distrusted by the less-developed countries (L.D.C.s), and it will never achieve either its economic and political potential as a major international agency, or its supposed goal of ordered world economic prosperity.